"Live Where You Want. Invest Where it Makes Sense!" ™

Archive for the 'General Real Estate' Category

I came up with the following rules of successful real estate investing over my many years of successes and failures. These are the same rules I follow today and share with our clients at Norada Real Estate Investments.

1. Educate Yourself

Knowledge is the new currency. Without it you are doomed to follow other people’s advice without knowing if it’s good or bad.

Types of Mortgage Loans

When you start searching for mortgage options, you will probably find out that there are different types of mortgage loans to choose from. With so many types of mortgage loans, you may most likely don’t know where to begin. You know you need to pick the best mortgage rate, however, you ought to comprehend this doesn’t really mean going for the mortgage with lowest rate. This is because there are some other variables to consider which can influence your decision.

There are some mortgage options which should know about financing investment properties. Let us discuss the 4 most popular types of mortgages in real estate. The motivation behind this article is to educate you on different types of real estate investment loans that you can use in your real estate investing.

Each year, Think Realty honors the leaders and change-makers of real estate who represent the best the industry has to offer. These individuals are nominated by their peers, and the finalists are determined by an independent panel of judges who are former Think Realty Honors recipients themselves.

Their stories range from new investors just beginning (and exponentially growing) to true industry veterans with decades of experience, from single-family investors focused on just a few neighborhoods to multifamily moguls buying millions of dollars’ worth of real estate at a time, and from major industry players employing hundreds of real estate experts to one-man (or -woman) operations making a difference with just the energy of the CEO alone.

This year, Norada Real Estate’s very own founder and CEO, Marco Santarelli, was awarded Think Realty’s highest honor of Master Investor of the Year.Read more »

The IRS has instituted new audit rules which require every LLC Operating Agreement and Limited Partnership (LP) Agreement to be amended. While we have never experienced such a dramatic requirement, it is important to make document amendments before December 31, 2017. The IRS likes to penalize non-compliance.

One of the things I love most about my work is seeing people move from the left side of the CashFlow Quadrant to the right side of the quadrant.

The process of moving from being an employee or self-employed to a business owner or sophisticated investor is a bit like that of a caterpillar turning into a beautiful butterfly. It takes time, and often requires a total transformation in mindset and behavior.

Since the Great Recession, crowdsourcing and the sharing economy have become increasingly popular, especially among younger people who were especially hard hit by the collapse. Millennials have been using crowdsourcing to fund artistic endeavors, art projects, and now — real estate.

New commercial real estate crowdfunding firms have emerged with a bang, with estimates placing the industry’s income around $3.5 billion in 2016, just years after it began to appear.

The principal tool for crowdfunded real estate is Electronic Real Estate Investment Trusts, which have allowed companies to greatly expand their pool of investors.

Traditionally, real estate has been a very popular investment vehicle, but often cost prohibitive for young people. However, among those who have invested in real estate, 96% credit it with their financial success. But for most people, securing enough financing for the down payment alone, which can be as high as 25% the cost of the property, can be a challenge.

For a long time, non-traded REITs were the best bet for lower income investors to diversify their portfolio with real estate. The high front-end fees, which can range from 10% to 15%, still discouraged many investors from buying in.

Now, eREITs have a significant advantage. Because their online platform allows them to cut out the middleman, crowdfunded real estate firms are able to significantly lower the fees required, or eliminate them all together.

For crowdfunded firms, the ability to appeal to lower income investors might represent the key to success. Real estate investor Jay Maddox told National Real Estate Investor Online that while institutional investors shy away from crowdfunded real estate, the sector is on the brink of massive expansion.

“I also think it is really going to be the best fit for properties that are well below institutional investor’s radar screen.”

That means that, in order for crowdfunded real estate businesses to thrive, they will need to pick their targets carefully. A Florida based business, for instance, might not be able to compete in the major Florida destinations towns like Miami or Orlando, but there are still 1,200 miles of sand beach and 1,800 miles of coastline for them to find a less competitive space to develop.

The proliferation of crowdfunded real estate firms has been beneficial for more people than just the investors, or even those in the real estate industry. The rapid acceleration of online investment platforms has also been a boon for the information and technology industry, which is responsible for the design, operation, and security of such sites.

At the same time, there have been signs of trouble within the industry. Crowdfunding platform iFunding, in particular, has garnered a great deal of negative attention lately, with investors and real estate professions bemoaning the poor organization structure and operations.

When speaking to National Real Estate Investor Online, he said, “There could be a day down the road where players that have traditionally raised money for institutional investors could be looking at this retail channel as a supplement, or even as an alternative when it gets big enough.”

Before you can become rich, you must decide whether you want to be secure, comfortable, or rich. These are called core values, or the reasons you want to invest.

The first reason most people invest is because they want to feel more secure. That’s why Social Security or a retirement plan is very popular with people whose core value is the need for security. Security is a very important aspect of investing. You don’t want to be a destitute out on the streets with nobody taking care of you.

How will the real estate market be impacted by Donald Trump’s victory and Republicans controlling both chambers of Congress?

Though Mr. Trump is a real estate man, his policy platform has been largely vague on real estate proposals. Here are my thoughts on how certain real estate issues may play out under President Trump and of their potential impact to consumers.

The number of people considered to be ‘High Net Worth’ (those with assets of more than $30 million) is predicted to increase by 95,000 over the next ten years. With this in mind, it is expected that a growing number of people will be dipping into the luxury real estate market. So where countries hold the most expensive real estate in the world?

What has always fascinated me about real estate investors is how differently we analyze rental properties. While we all use (mostly) the same ratios and numbers, the sheer number of available calculators, spreadsheets and other analysis tools is incredible. And it often takes a lot of trial and error to find the method or tool that works well for you.